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Future proof: Britain in the 2020s, an IPPR explainer - Environment

Humankind’s Promethean capacity to dominate and reshape the natural environment for its own benefit will hit a limit in the coming decades.

The Anthropocene age – the new geological epoch in which human activity is the central and destructive influence on the Earth’s ecosystems – will require us to fundamentally change how we produce and consume energy in the 2020s. This imperative will set the UK on a trajectory towards a radically different, low-carbon and increasingly local and decentralised energy system. This change will – if a just transition to a low carbon future can be effectively managed – bring immense social, environmental and economic benefits. In the process, responding to climate change will change how we work, consume, travel and live.